


200 Stories

by scarrletmoon



Category: Doctor Who (2005), Frankenstein - Mary Shelley, Merlin (TV), Sherlock (TV), Supernatural
Genre: Alchemy, Alternate Universe - Coffee Shop, Apologies, Challenge Response, F/M, Fluff and Angst, Friendship, Gen, Immortality, Love Letters, M/M, Not Beta Read, Self-Sacrifice, Skype, Suicide, Teenlock, Tumblr Ask Box Fic, Video & Computer Games
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2013-01-03
Updated: 2013-02-16
Packaged: 2017-11-19 09:46:29
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 7
Words: 5,760
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/571950
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scarrletmoon/pseuds/scarrletmoon
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Response to The Ultimate FanFic Challenge. 200 Stories for different fandoms.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapters

**Author's Note:**

> The first thing I thought of was The Doctor- the entire show involves him running around blowing things up and fixing things, so why not pick him? But which Doctor to use?
> 
> The one who hates himself the most.

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Since this is a collection of stories for several fandoms, I think a chapter index is in order.

**2\. Destroy:** Doctor Who   
 **3\. Bittersweet:** Merlin (Gwen/Arthur)  
 **4\. Hello:** Sherlock (John/Sherlock)  
 **5\. Suicide:** Supernatural   
 **6\. Immortality:** Sherlock   
 **7\. Play:** Sherlock (John/Sherlock)


	2. Destroy

It is very often that I must make a choice, yet extremely rare that the choice is easy. I oversee the destruction of worlds, the demise of entire races; I see them as they are born, as they grow and more often than not I am responsible for their deaths. I am what every creature in the known universe has come to fear and hate- or, if you so happen to be the right person, I am a force that you call to for help, that you would sacrifice yourself for out of the belief that I am just and good.  
  
I am a murderer, a destroyer of worlds yet there has never been a time when you have failed to come if I ever needed your help. You love me. You think there is something to be saved. You don’t want me to be alone. I am cruel and dark yet you still find light in me where I thought it was dead. I could ruin your lives a thousand times over, yet you would still try anything and everything to save me. I am dangerous. I inspire bravery where it is lethal and I deserve no forgiveness.  
  
Have I fooled them? Is they why they fear me but continue to come back, still want to travel with me through the universe? Have I deluded them into thinking that I don’t intend for any of this to happen, that I am inherently kind, that I would never allow harm to come to the right people? Do they truly think that I am everything I seem to be?  
  
I lie. I pretend. I fake cheerfulness and I keep secrets. I am a lonely old man flying through the universe in a stolen blue box and I am nothing of what I appear to be. Has the number of saved and living surpassed the number of dead? Can the lives I have saved overrule the ones I have allowed to perish? Do I really have a reason to hate myself?  
  
The answer, I think, as it has been for hundreds of years, is yes. I have changed from the old man to the younger, with the same distinct air of misleadingly endearing instability, but I have grown darker and more powerful and more terrifying.  
  
And I am waiting for the end. I am waiting for the last regeneration, and for the last thing I destroy to be myself.  
 ****


	3. Bittersweet

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Season 4. Gwen reflects on her time with Arthur after she is forced to leave.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I have fallen for this show and I will never be able to get up ever again, and for some reason I do not regret that at all. This is my first fic for Merlin, so I hope it goes well.

Do you remember our first kiss?  
  
I remember the hesitance and uncertainty of your lips- but when you pulled away, I saw in your eyes that you cared for me, how you wondered if I felt the same, how grateful you were that I was here with you.   
  
How could I have reacted then, when I am only a servant and you became the king of Camelot? Should I have kissed you? How could I have thought that we would be together, forever, just like I wanted,  like I thought we both wanted?   
  
Arthur.   
  
Do you remember when you wouldn’t let me fight? When Morgana was a friend, when your father was still strong and powerful (although he still made mistakes that you are better at avoiding, and I am so proud of you for that); do you remember when I argued and told you that the women could fight too? Was it then that your feelings started? Was it then when mine began?   
  
I remember when my father was killed. I suppose I could have become like Morgana then, followed her into darkness and never returned- but I couldn’t. It was never in me. Maybe it is because I do not have magic, but then the Druids...what would you think of me if I said that I don’t think they are evil? They are peaceful, Arthur. I hope you see that. Your father was wrong about many things, and you don’t know how much I hope that you never follow him completely. Beware of your council, love.   
  
Even though I am gone now, I still cherish the moments we had together. I remember our day in the forest vividly still, and the moment when your father and Morgana found us. But before that I remember being happier than I had ever been. I wanted to stay with you. I loved you- I still love you, more than anyone and anything in the world, and being without you pains me more than any physical agony you or I could imagine. If I heard that you were in danger now, I would run to save you, even if it meant that my return would be my death. If it was the last thing I could give you, then my life would truly be precious.   
  
I love you, Arthur. I am truly sorry for my mistakes. If I could live those days again, I would have left Camelot for a while, gathered my senses, thought things through, stopped myself.. I never wanted to betray you. I would have thought that I would die before I would betray you, but these words...you will never see them now. I have wronged and hurt you, and I suppose that I deserve this.   
  
But I feel like this urge, this compelling desire to see Lancelot was never mine. It was once, a long time ago, before I realized that I loved and needed only you, but I never wanted this now. I never wanted you to find me with him, to break your heart like that and for Lancelot to take his life. But there was something there that clouded my judgement, that made me want him like I hadn’t for years- these were feelings that I had set aside and forgotten before Lancelot returned, feelings that I knew would never go back to.   
  
But there was that kiss, that embrace that made me a traitor in your eyes, and there is nothing I can do to stop you from seeing that, nor to explain why I did it. I never wanted it. I only felt it. I should have been so much stronger. I do not know why I wasn’t.   
  
No one can fix this other than ourselves, but I fear- no, I am sure- that we never will.   
  
For my failures and shortcomings, Arthur, I am truly sorry.   
  
Please.   
  
Forgive me.


	4. Hello

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> After being discharged from Afghanistan, John tries to calm things down by taking a job in a coffee shop in London. Unfortunately, his brief escapade with normality is short-lived, when he meets Sherlock Holmes. Coffee Shop AU.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> For irhystherant on Tumblr, who asked for Johnlock and tea. I took it upon myself to write a coffee shop AU because we need more of those. 
> 
> Also, I saw a post earlier where someone (areyoutryingtodeduceme ?) wanted a coffee shop AU?
> 
> Don't hold me to that, I have a terrible memory. 
> 
> In the course of writing this, my web browser shut down so this isn't what I initially wrote, but I think I did a better job on this even when I'm currently in a state of wanting to throw things because I can't write. 
> 
> Anyway. 
> 
> You're welcome.

John was almost completely sure that he’d seen a murder, but not sure enough to actually tell the right people about it.   
  
It started a few weeks ago, with a man in a dark coat and a bag slung over his shoulder that seemed to hold a number of mysterious sharp objects. John only looked up from the cash register for a second, but something about the man caught his eye. Maybe it was the way he swept rather than walked into the room, John thought, or the way he looked perpetually unamused by everything.  
  
“Black. Two sugars, please.”   
  
Or maybe it was the stunningly smooth baritone of his voice, John wondered, stunned.   
  
The man got looks, of course. He was the type of person who never went unnoticed, it seemed, but he had a cold, unfriendly exterior that kept people away. He spent his hour in the cafe on his phone, and never once put it down even while he was drinking his coffee. It looked like emails from where John was standing (not that he stood there for the sake of reading over the man’s shoulder, of course), notes and pictures of-  
  
John had only walked over to ask if the man needed anything else, and had spluttered in the middle of asking his question. The man looked up and John apologised, turned around, and   
spent the next few minutes behind the counter until the man left.   
  
Whatever he had seen that had weirdly looked a lot like a bloody corpse, John told himself, had to be nothing more than his wild imagination. John had never actually considered himself to have a wild imagination, but it was a better alternative to what he thought the man could have been doing with pictures of mutilated bodies on his mobile phone.   
  
The man came back the next day.  
  
John had been hoping that he wouldn’t have to see him again. He’d suffered enough embarrassment and drama for a week at least, so when he turned around from refilling the coffee machine to see that familiar dark figure glide into the shop, he felt his stomach drop somewhere into the sewers. Sarah had just ducked into the back of the shop to get something and everyone else was mysteriously busy, so John was left with no choice but the confront the man and hope he’d forgotten about yesterday. But  man’s eyes lingered on John’s after he took his coffee, and John held his breath and waited for the man to say something.   
  
He didn’t.  
  
It wasn’t until later that the man finally spoke- without so much as a “hello”,  John noted irritably.   
  
“How long has it been?”  
  
John looked up in the middle of wiping down the table across from the man. “What?”  
  
“How long has it been since you came back from the war?” he asked again, watching John over the rim of his cup. His gaze was piercing, scrutinizing, and John felt uncomfortable under it.   
  
“About…six months.” He sounded uncertain, as if he wasn’t entirely sure why he was answering in the first place, because he wasn’t.  ”Sorry, who told you?”   
  
“Not who,” the man answered, “what. Your limp.”  
  
“My limp?”  
  
“Yes.”  
  
John suddenly felt very self-conscious. The limp had gotten better over the last few months, to the point where he was beginning to get used to it and it wasn’t as inconvenient as it used to be. He was proud of his progress, but now it felt like a liability all over again. It marked him as weak, as a cripple, and he hated it almost as much as he hated himself for everything he felt now.   
  
John waited for the man to explain further, but after a minute of silence when it was obvious that he wasn’t going to say anything else, John left him alone.  
  
It bothered him, really bothered him more than it should have. He hadn’t expected it to become a constant itch in his side, to become every second thought or to keep him up for an unnecessarily long time that night, but it did. He was so annoyed by it that by the time he got to work the next morning, he had argument all planned out in his head. The man had seemed far too sure of himself when he’d pointed out the limp. It hadn’t been a wild guess, and that was the most frustrating part. John was ask him what the hell was going on, and then he get on with his life in peace.   
  
But the man never came.   
  
John was irrationally annoyed; so much so that when Sarah noticed and asked what was wrong, she got a sharp “Nothing” in response for her trouble.  
  
Everyone stayed a good distance away from him after that.   
  
It was another week, of course, before the man came back when John was least expecting it.  
  
He didn’t say anything. He didn’t really have to. After the initial shock, John made up a cup of coffee and pushed it towards him without a word.   
  
“You remembered,” the man said.   
  
“I did.”  
  
Surprisingly, the man stayed and took a seat by the counter. It didn’t bother John as much as he thought it should have, and the man didn’t say anything else while John was occupied by the next few customers that came in.   
  
“Remarkable.”  
  
John paused in the middle of setting out a new tray of cakes in the display. “What is?”  
  
“You.”  
  
“Really.” He sounded unimpressed, which he was aiming for- to let on how curious he was wouldn’t do anything to help his own self-image, never mind what anyone else thought of him. He had to at least pretend that he didn’t care.   
  
“Most people avoid me after I say things about them that they haven’t told anyone” he explained, taking a sip of coffee. “I tend to…repel people.”  
  
“You can’t have met very many nice people,” John said unthinkingly, and stopped suddenly in the middle of wiping down the counter. He wasn’t entirely sure where that had come from, and they were both quiet for a beat before the man put out his hand.  
  
“Sherlock Holmes.”  
  
John stared at the man’s hand for longer than was really polite before he took it. “John Watson.”   
Sherlock left after that.   
  
Even though he’d told John who he was, he didn’t expect Holmes to come back.   
  
-  
  
“You didn’t think I’d come back, but you made my coffee anyway?”  
  
John avoided Sherlock’s eyes. He’d been trying to prepare himself for disappointment all day, yet despite himself he had hoped. His hope hadn’t been completely wasted either, although in retrospect, the coffee making was a little pathetic on his part.   
  
“You’re a regular customer,” he shrugged. “It was still possible.”   
  
Sherlock was silent while John dealt with other customers and tables and Sarah yelling in the back for help with boxes. He didn’t leave at his usual time either, and it surprised John to see him still sitting by the counter, scrolling through messages on his phone when he reemerged from the dusty storeroom.   
  
John was just counting the money in the register when Sherlock spoke again.  
  
“Do you miss it?”  
  
When John turned, he found Sherlock’s eyes on him; softer than before, genuinely curious rather than calculating for once.   
  
It wasn’t necessary, but since things had quietened down by now, he figured he had the time for it. He closed the register, poured himself a cup of tea he’d made earlier and sat down at a table. Sherlock followed.   
  
“Miss what?” he asked.   
  
“The war.”  
  
John knew what he’d told his therapist, what he’d told his sister and his mother when she’d called. He knew what everyone else had assumed, and he knew what was the truth and why the nightmares weren’t entirely nightmares.   
  
“Yes.”  
  
Sherlock’s expression didn’t change. He nodded, as if he’d known all along. John didn’t ask how. He found himself strangely thinking that there’d be time for that later. He felt better for having told Sherlock too, despite the fact that he barely knew the man.  
  
“How did you know that I was a soldier in the first place?” John asked. “Who have you been talking to?”  
  
Something sparked in Sherlock’s eyes then, and John realized he’d stumbled across something important. Later he’d realize that there were a few things Sherlock was passionate about, and one of them was his own stunning brilliance.   
  
“No one you know, I’m sure,” he assured. John found that smirk as amusing as it was irritating.   
  
“Then how did you know?”  
  
“By the way you hold yourself and fact that your tan doesn’t extend past your wrists; your psychosomatic limp and the way that you speak. A simple series of deductions. I didn’t know. I observed.”   
John could see how this could push people away. He also knew that he wasn’t one of those people.   
  
“And I’m sorry to disappoint you, but I’m not actually a serial killer,” Sherlock continued. “Although the fact that you continued to talk to me after you thought so could be seen as a cause for concern.”  
  
John shifted uncomfortably in his seat at being found out. “I never said-“  
  
“No, but it was all over your face.”  
  
Sherlock was insufferable. He was getting so much enjoyment out of this it was almost criminal.   
John sighed. “What are you then?” he asked, even though he knew Sherlock would tell him whether he wanted to know or not.   
  
“A consulting detective.”  
  
“So you…solve crimes for people?”   
  
“The police, yes.”  
  
John frowned. “But the police don’t go to-“  
  
“They come to me when they can’t solve a case, which, sadly, is almost always.” The arrogance was almost too much, John thought. “It can be… adventurous. Dangerous.” He paused to take a sip of coffee. “Bloody.”  
  
“Exciting,” John offered.  
  
The smile Sherlock gave John was worryingly mischievous. “Exactly.”  
  
“So the pictures you were looking at the other day,” John asked, relieved that he was finally getting answers. “They were from cases.”  
  
“No.” Sherlock set down his cup and steepled his fingers over his lips. “At least, not all of them.”  
  
John felt his heart skip. That changed a lot of things. “No?”  
  
“My work grants me access to various morgues, bodies…I use some of them for experiments.”  
  
John waited. “You’re joking.”  
  
“Why would I be joking?” Sherlock seemed genuinely confused by this, and John was too amazed to give an answer. ”Does it bother you?” he asked sincerely.   
  
When John honestly thought about it, he realized that it didn’t. He supposed that was bad, but at this point he didn’t care.  
  
Sherlock saw the answer on John’s face without asking for it, and the same exited glint was back in his eyes.   
  
“I have another case tonight.”  
  
“Normal people just go out to dinner together.”  
  
Sherlock frowned. “I wasn’t asking you out.”  
  
John raised his eyebrows. “Weren’t you?”  
  
Sherlock visibly contemplated this and apparently concluded that John was right.  
  
“There’ll be a cab waiting outside your flat at six o’clock.”  
  
“You know where I live?” John was starting to wonder what he was really  getting himself into.  
  
Sherlock gave him a look. “You’re hardly the Fort Knox of secrets, John.”   
  
He sighed.


	5. Suicide

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Castiel reflects on his time before and after the Winchesters before his sacrifice.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> c-ass-butts on Tumblr as for "suicide" and "Destiel"
> 
> This is actually the first fanfic I've written for Supernatural, so I hope it all goes well. 
> 
> This was a lot of fun to write actually, despite that fact that it's about...well. 
> 
> Still. 
> 
> I hope you like it.

There was a time that Castiel could remember, when they had felt invincible. Even God’s beloved animals (the humans, dirty and loud and brutish) believed that they, the angels, were immortal. And they were, for a time. The angels stayed by God’s side in Heaven and watched as the world grew. Earth grew beautifully.   
  
It wasn’t like the angels cared about the humans anyway. But God’s love had been divided, and Heaven didn’t take this well.   
  
Castiel could still remember Lucifer- God’s most beloved and the most charismatic, even for an angel; impossibly bright and inspiring to everyone he chose to enlighten. Lucifer was his brother. They loved each other because they were God’s first family.   
  
But there came  a shift after the humans, a dark change that started somewhere and rippled outwards through all of them. It was a thought, a seed planted in an unlikely place, one that had never once been considered in the vacuum of timeless space until now. It was dangerous and extremely powerful, and Lucifer had created it.   
  
The humans were a nuisance.   
  
What was terrifying, was that for a moment, they all agreed. They had no choice but to follow God (not that any of them minded, since they’d known nothing else) but suddenly there was a choice. There was something new and horrifying and suddenly no longer exclusive to humans.   
  
It was free will.   
  
The humans were allowed to choose, he said. He wasn’t angry, at least not at first. He only wanted to know why. Why  were they so loved by God? Were they more beautiful, more clever? Were they easier to love than the flawless immortal angels?   
  
He had seen them, he told his brothers and sisters, seen them wander stupidly and aimlessly around their meaningless paradise. He couldn’t love them, he said, when they had not merited his love, nor shown any usefulness whatsoever. God’s love for them was unconditional, but Lucifer’s was not. And if the humans were just an experiment created by their Father in the middle of a crisis, in a fit of boredom or as an exercise of his power, then there was no reason to love them. God had His angels. Nothing else needed to exist in the Universe to divide his love.  
  
But God demanded that they be loved, and Lucifer was furious.   
  
There was a war like they had never seen- the Universe trembled under the angels’ power, and for a brief, brilliant moment it seemed as if Lucifer would win; God had given him power and he used it to pull the angels to his side, to convince them that with their strength, they could make Father see sense.   
  
There was no sense to be made. Father had decided a long time ago what he wanted. If the angels loved Him, they would love the humans too.  
  
Lucifer and his followers were given their choice. To love, or be cast out of Heaven.  
  
It was only after Castiel himself travelled to Earth and learned of the humans’ freedom that he began to think of his brother as brave. To be brave enough to defy the Creator and to withstand the pain of Hell for so long was no easy feat. Freedom was something to be fought for, Castiel realized; it was precious and inestimable and something the angel found himself holding on to even after he left the Winchesters.  
  
The Winchesters.   
  
Heaven had heard about them. There wasn’t anyone now who hadn’t; they were brilliant fighters, formidable hunters and by now they were feared by every living creature that was any sort of threat to humans. They were not known for their mercy. Threatening their weaknesses only made them stronger.   
  
Of course. They were Michael and Lucifer’s vessels. God must have truly loved his sons then, if he created such powerful creatures to be their vessels. The Winchesters may have been human, but they were far from ordinary.   
  
Perhaps that was why Castiel began to grow fond of them. It hadn’t been intentional. He hadn’t even meant to stay as long as he had. He was merely the angel who pulled Dean from Hell and back onto the path that had been created for him. Dean and his brother were only pieces in their war, vulnerable human pieces which were only slightly less irritating than other, less important human beings that tottered around their tedious, oblivious lives..   
  
But the Winchesters had shown the angel freedom and called him by a new name, and Castiel changed into something unrecognizable.  
  
Cas made mistakes. Cas defied his Father, and when God disappeared, the angel tried to become Him.   
  
He realized afterwards, that he had underestimated humans. He and his brothers and sisters all had. To live with their free will and not all become so conceited and foolish and drunk with power showed that they had more strength than any of them had thought. Humans were complex and strange and beautiful, and they fascinated Cas. But what was most important was the fondness of the Winchesters that brought Cas to do things Castiel would never have considered.   
  
He loved.   
  
He loved Dean. He worried about him, watched over him and kept him safe. Even when Dean believed he had no one left, Cas was there. He was always there. But it wasn’t as if he could ever admit to it. He was an angel; Dean was human. Nothing good could ever come of it, especially to the Winchesters who were damned to eternal misery.   
  
Purgatory made him realize his mistakes. Purgatory made him see his flaws, and he started to understand Dean’s self-loathing (although he wished he could stop Dean from hating himself- he was almost innocent compared to what Castiel felt he had done). Castiel was despicable,  an abomination, a virus and a disease. Trying to bring free will to Heaven would never work. It was built on obedience as God had intended. Castiel  was a fool for even considering the possibility of defying the omniscient Father.  
  
Yet when he returned, he could not overlook or take away his own love. It stuck, clutched to every fibre of his being; he knew he would do anything to keep the Winchesters safe, especially if it meant never being alone. He could never go back home to Heaven, and he knew he would give up his life to stay.   
  
And he did one day there was a fight, one that was more dangerous than anything they had ever faced. There was blood- but there was always blood- and there was pain and broken bones and a determination in Dean’s eyes that burned and even struck fear in the last demons to fall under the man’s fury. For a shining moment, it seemed that even though his brother had fallen (or perhaps especially  since his brother had fallen) he had the impossible strength to cut down the last angel that stood in his way.   
  
But there was  a blade in that angel’s hand, Cas saw, and it caught the light and screamed, and for a moment the angel felt true fear.   
  
It would kill Dean, Cas knew, but it wouldn’t kill him.   
  
Yet it was only when the blade ran right through his body (his vessel’s body), that he realized his mistake.   
  
Castiel looked up into his brother’s eyes, confused and terrified and shocked.  There were tears in those eyes.  
  
“I knew you would do anything for him,” Lucifer murmured. “I knew. But this war must be fought, Castiel.”  
  
There was a darkness now, creeping into the angel’s vision, and behind him he could hear Dean’s voice, screaming.   
  
“Brother.”  
  
“I am sorry.”


	6. Immortality

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock plays God, and naturally, realizes his mistake.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> petermotherfuckingpan on Tumblr asked for Johnlock and Immortality 
> 
> After trying for about 2 weeks to write various things involving vampires, werewolves and briefly considering merpeople, I settled on
> 
> a Frankenstein/Sherlock cross-over

After so many years of study and travel and seclusion, I had found it. It was my life’s work, my only thought and concentration for so long that I no longer cared for anything else. My life was consumed by anatomy and robbed graves, darkness and the almost insignificant light from solitary candles and small lamps. Years of accumulated books and papers littered every space that wasn’t stained with blood or earth, and my failed experiments lay crumpled and broken in an ignored corner. My focus remained on the final touches of my last test, the results of which would either render my life meaningless or change it. I had nothing after this; I depended on my success so absolutely that failing in this, I had kept a rope tucked away in the eaves somewhere.   
  
Electricity. I had realized its power in a dream of recalled memories; I remembered in the lightning strike I saw as a child that burned a tree with its power. I remembered my wonder and awe and the fascination in science that it kindled. Somewhere in my studies I forgot about it, although it still lingered in a part of my mind that I believed to be unimportant, at least until this dream (or perhaps nightmare, since the lightning strike in my dream sttuck Victor, and I needed no reminder of what had brought me on this journey in the first place).   
  
If I could create man- become a god- perhaps then I could forgive myself for my shortcomings and the mistakes that I had made that had cost me more than could ever be forgiven or replaced.  
  
The windows shook with the force of the storm. So covered in dust was the glass that I never bothered to look out anymore- any news I needed I received through periodic letters from my brother and from my brief ventures outside. Now, I raced against the storm, listening intently to every roll of thunder and extinguished candles until I depended almost exclusively on the lightning’s flashes in order to see. I had never felt so exhilarated, so passionate and alive.   
  
Alive.  
  
I looked at the creature that I had created with my own mortal hands. Perhaps with this, I would never only be a man, and  perhaps with this the dead could continue living and I could watch over my people and never have to see them perish as I had so many others. Humans were so fragile and clumsy, weak and tragically frail. But with my power I could create life and what Great Creator could ever hope to stop me, I, maker and alchemist, Sherlock Holmes?   
  
And at that moment, after the last flash of lightening struck, my creation began to move. Slowly at first, excruciatingly slowly, and I waited with bated breath and held perfectly still, as if so much as the twitch of a muscle would kill my creature.   
  
My son, I realized, as his eyelids twitched as he woke, I had created my son.   
  
For a moment, I felt true joy.  it was more than the scientists excitement; it was a father’s euphoria, the first turning of the heart at the sight of a newborn’s smile; it was pride and astonishment and a feeling that I will never forget, even as the thing that I had called my son began to change.   
  
I had chosen features to make hiit m beautiful- a god could not let his first creation be ugly after all. Before life it bore the face that sculptors and painters of the Renaissance only imagined onto canvas and stone. It was, for at least a little while, beautiful.   
  
Yet his eyes opened and suddenly I realized that everything was wrong. The eyes did not match and lines of neat stitches did not disguise the fact that this life had been messily sewn together like a ragdoll. It attempted to sit up, and its movements were childish and messy and hopeless,nothing like the grace I had imagined. I would have been able to overlook it, had it not been for how desperately it looked at me.   
  
_Why have you created me?_   
  
I had had a name chosen, taken from the graves I had borne it from. A  John Watson, one that was not new in history by any means but that I dreamed to become great. John Watson would be the first immortal man, and I would follow soon after, and others that I had lost. If I could bring John Watson from dead, I could bring others too.  
  
But John was wrong. John said nothing as he struggled- and the sounds he made were helpless whines that sounded worse than any wounded beast I had ever come across- but with every look he gave me I hated myself.   
  
A god did not hate himself. A god looked for glory and praise and had no room for self-hatred. I was to be admired, _canonized, feared, loved._  
  
But with this creature! John watched me and begged for me to explain, and I could not take responsibility for this life that had so foolishly thought that I could control. I was not the Creator that I had set out to be.   
  
And so with these hands I took that life and scattered the pieces, burned my shattered home and ran, but could never forget John Watson's eyes and his stares  and confusion and innocence.   
  
Immortality could never be achieved by mere men.   
  
My place was by Victor, and that was where I ran that night.


	7. Play

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> Sherlock finally breaks out his dusty, unused Xbox after multiple prompts from John. Teenlock.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> There's this brilliant genius on Tumblr who runs a blog called Imagine Your OTP and I couldn't resist:
> 
> _Imagine your OTP video-calling on Skype, each playing their favorite video games._

“I really don’t see the point of this.”

John grinned. Even with most of his concentration focused on trying not to die repeatedly as he tried to make another jump, he could see Sherlock’s unimpressed expression out of the corner of his eye on his laptop screen. It had been John’s idea of course, and even though he’d been bothering Sherlock about it for months, he hadn’t actually expected him to buy the game and turn on his console because John insisted. Sherlock had said that he hadn’t touched a video game since he was eight. But he supposed it was worth it to see the excitement on John’s face.   
  
“It’s  _fun_ ,” John insisted, and Sherlock sighed dramatically for the fifth time in ten minutes. “But if you’re going to start whinging, let me know so I can mute you.”

He didn’t need to look at his computer screen to know that Sherlock was scowling.

“I don’t  _whinge,”_ Sherlock griped. John could hear him angrily stabbing buttons on his controller. “It’s not whinging if it’s a valid complaint.”

“Like-  _fuck-_ that time you went on for half an hour about Mycroft unnecessarily worrying about you?”

“He wasn’t worrying, he was-  _for God’s sake-_ invading my privacy.”

“You know, there are-  _shit_ \- actual human beings that care about you, Sherlock.”

“I’d like it if he cared about me from a distance,” Sherlock muttered. “I hope you realize scenery in this game is horrifyingly unrealistic.”

“ _Entertainingly_ unrealistic,” John insisted. “Would you like  _me_  to care from a distance?”

Sherlock was suddenly silent. When John glanced at his computer, the boy was looking very determinedly away from the camera.

“Sherlock?”

They’d only known each other for a few months and had never actually met, but Sherlock was his best friend. It still amazed him that they’d met at all: he could have stumbled across anyone in that chat room that night, but of course it had to be the person who lived hundreds of miles away in the opposite direction. John had worried since the beginning that Sherlock would get bored of him and disappear: he was so much more interesting after all, far more intelligent and brilliant than anyone John had ever met, and it was only a matter of time before Sherlock decided he was better off talking to someone who didn’t wake him up at three in the morning because of a stupid nightmare about watching his sister die-

(Then again, Sherlock had taken that as an invitation to call him at any time from midnight to four in the morning; John fell asleep sometimes, and then woke up to the disconnected call and  _sleep well_ left in the message box)

“No.”

John blinked. His avatar took a graceful nosedive off the edge of the platform and he made no attempt to save it.

“No what?”

Sherlock cleared his throat nervously. “I mean, I wouldn’t. Want you to worry from a distance, I mean. Or worry at all. Especially from a distance.”

John put down his controller. Sherlock wouldn’t meet his eyes.

He thought about saying something about how he appreciated that Sherlock cared about him. He thought about commenting on the fact that his friend was  _blushing_. And he briefly considered calling Sherlock an idiot, which he was.   
  
“You know, this game is a lot more interesting in two player mode,” he said instead.

Sherlock huffed a laugh. “Come over here and show me, then.”

John grinned again, and when Sherlock noticed, he was treated to another one of those rare, genuine smiles.

He couldn’t wait to see it in real life.


End file.
